As I’ve said before, being frugal is about controlling your money and making choices so that you can allow yourself to splurge, because if you aren’t controlling your money, your money will control you.  That sounds easy enough but in reality living frugally is not easy at all.  It’s something that I struggle with daily, ... Read the rest »

Hi, my name is Daniel, and I… lost track of my finances.  I write (what is for the most part) a personal finance blog, so you’d think that I would track every penney, but I don’t.  We budget to pay ourselves first (savings/retirement), pay all of our bills, and then everything else is give and take.  One month we ... Read the rest »

Our society has a perception complex. We are raised to judge and compare ourselves against others and our perceptions of other people become our own reality. We are trained from an early age in this regard. In school it didn’t matter if I got a “C” on a project as long as it was in ... Read the rest »

When Did Frugality Cease Being a Virtue in Our Society?  Really no matter how far you look back in history Frugality has always been a virtue.  ”He who gathers money little by little makes it grow” - Proverbs 13:11 Here the bible calls upon us to save where we can, even a little bit helps, and ... Read the rest »

I took an investments class the during the Fall semester of my Senior year in college, and when I say “took” I mean that I dutifully attended every class, sat in the front row, and tried with all my heart to understand what the hell he was talking about.  It wasn’t that I didn’t understand the ... Read the rest »

In college I thought I had learned everything.  I learned finance in and out, I learned economics, marketing, advertising, managing, forecasting, social drinking, networking, and every other aspect of business that I could think of.  I was a badass.  Nope.  As soon as I started work, I ate my piece of humble pie.  Why is it that ... Read the rest »

I got my first credit card when I was 19. It was a Citi American AAdvantage card. As I got older I slowly accumulated more credit cards, and by the time I graduated college I had 5, all with Citi, all with rates between 15 and 20%. Shortly after graduation, I financed our cross-country move, ... Read the rest »